


About a Boy I Thought I Knew

by Lynx22281



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Drabble, Episode: s10e12 About A Boy, Gen, Sam's POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-29
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-20 07:26:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3641742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lynx22281/pseuds/Lynx22281
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's immediate inner thoughts when 14-year-old Dean shows up at the motel (this scene: <a href="http://mooseleys.tumblr.com/post/110036908833">http://mooseleys.tumblr.com/post/110036908833</a>)</p>
            </blockquote>





	About a Boy I Thought I Knew

Sam stares at Dean. At 14-year-old Dean. 

  


And he remembers. 

  


He remembers 14-year-old Dean being larger than life to his scrawny, short 10-year-old self. He remembers thinking his brother was impossibly tall, terribly grown-up, superhumanly invincible. Four years seemed like an eternity between the middle schooler and his high school-aged brother at the time. 

  


The kid Sam's looking at now is not that rose-colored memory planted in a brain that was only a decade old and didn’t know much more than the inside of ratty motel rooms and cheap diner food. 

  


This 14-year-old is scrawny too. His clothes swallow him whole, creating the illusion of somebody much bigger inside them. Thirty-six-year-old Dean still piles on the layers, still thinks he'll never be enough.

  


He's got delicate features - thin shoulders holding up a thin neck, prominent cheeks, collarbones that stick out from the too big neck of his striped t-shirt. Sam's scared one strong gust of wind will knock him on his skinny ass. 

  


Those bow legs that have always gotten the girls (and probably a few guys too) riled up to be between should never have happened, Sam realizes. That very obvious character feature has to be the result of malnutrition and lack of calcium since Dean always brought the milk from his free school lunch home for Sam every weekday afternoon. It took six months of listlessness and grimaces from achy muscles and bones for their dad to finally realize something wasn't right with Dean. Of course in John Winchester's eyes, it was Dean's fault that the boy was passing the bulk of his food to his little brother and neglecting himself in the process.

  


_"How are you supposed to take care of Sammy if you dry up and blow away 'cause you starve yourself, Dean?"_

  


Well, that had only ended up in Dean spending time in the Boys' Home because he'd had to steal a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter to feed both of them. Because while John was quick to point out Dean's failings at raising his brother and himself, he wasn't quick to throw more cash into the kitty before he caught his next lead and went off on a wild goose chase three states over.

  


Sam sees all of that now and all he wants to do is whisk this kid away somewhere safe, give him a life with a yard and a dog and friends who won't get eaten by the monsters under their beds. Everything he's ever wanted for himself, he wants for this teenager even more. Because if anybody deserves a life of never worrying where the next meal is coming from, it's his big brother.

  


Dean's stuffing one of their backup pistols in the waistband of his pants

  


"Hey, we got any grenades?"

  


But, the Winchesters don't get what they want, do they?


End file.
